Tag Archives: republicans

The Washington Post points out that the cry for trying to shrink government that Republicans used to dog President Obama really wasn’t serious at all…But just a ‘do as want…But not what they’ll do ‘ now that they hold the spending power…..

Oh, and add to this their effort to pass tax cuts that will make the budget balancing charade worst….

Supply-siders are winning their struggle with deficit hawks over the fiscal soul of the GOP.

And it’s not even much of a struggle, as it turns out. In recent days, it has more closely resembled a pantomime, the policymaking equivalent of what the Harlem Globetrotters used to do to the Washington Generals. In this case, the Tax-Cutters are steamrolling the Budget Balancers — and making it look easy.

In the Senate, Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) was primed to force a reckoning over deficit spending in the Budget Committee. Republicans on the panel need to agree on a spending blueprint to lock in special instructions allowing them to pass a tax package without Democratic support. And with a one-vote edge in the committee, the GOP can’t afford to lose Corker. The Tennessean signaled that he’d drive a hard bargain over adding to the now $20 trillion federal debt, which he called “the greatest threat to our country” in an op-ed earlier this month.

But Corker on Tuesday struck a deal with Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), the committee’s leading supply-sider, that skews in favor of slashing taxes, deficits be damned. The agreement is expected to give the go-ahead to $1.5 trillion in tax cuts over 10 years. Corker says that will give Republicans running room to craft a tax package, and he reserves the right to oppose the final product if it unleashes too much red ink. Yet he’s already given away his moment of maximum leverage.

Over in the House, the self-appointed fiscal scolds in the Freedom Caucus have talked tough on deficits all year. That included threats to blow up their chamber’s budget if it failed to carry some $400 billion in mandatory savings. But the proposed House GOP spending plan trims only half that sum.

And the hard right has since witnessed the collapse of an Obamacare repeal bill that would have slashed the deficit by $119 billion — and a debt ceiling hike that rode along with an unpaid-for, $15 billion down payment on hurricane relief. Ringing up those charges has darkened a deficit picture that Republicans vowed to address: Federal spending this year is set to exceed collections by the widest gap since 2009, and the national debt topped $20 trillion this month for the first time in its history. ….

Congress has voted for bill to aid the disaster reliefe for Texas and probvably Florida, while increasing the countries debt ceiling allowing the Treasury to borrow more money to pay the countries bills….

President Trump gets a ‘deal’ he made by working WITH the Democrats and his adopted Republican party members….

The Trump White House is quietly courting a few dozen House Democrats on tax reform — eager to avoid the fate of the GOP’s straight party-line attempt to jam through a repeal of Obamacare.

Even as congressional GOP leaders largely embrace a partisan path on taxes, White House officials have been wooing 15 to 20 centrist House Democrats since early summer. The Trump administration is all too aware of congressional Republicans’ struggles to come together on a range of hot-button issues — from health care to government spending — and tax reform is littered with political minefields for the party.

So the president and his staff are opening a line of communication with moderate Democrats in case a Plan B is needed. At a mid-June dinner at the White House with four centrist House Democrats, President Donald Trump expressed interest in a bipartisan package combining tax reform with infrastructure spending, multiple sources said.

Since then, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, chief economic adviser Gary Cohn and top White House staff have huddled with conservative Democrats in the Blue Dog Coalition and the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus.

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Friday signaled a pivot to tax reform, one day after the Republican effort to repeal ObamaCare collapsed in the Senate.

Ryan urged Republicans not to give up on repealing and replacing the healthcare law, but his statement — coupled with comments from President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — suggest a shift for the GOP.

“I am disappointed and frustrated, but we should not give up. I encourage the Senate to continue working toward a real solution that keeps our promise,” Ryan said in a statement….

We’ll see if Senate majority Leader Mitch McDonnell has to walk across the political aisle to Democrats to get something he can win enough votes on…..

The terms for even talking are?

Democrats, for their part, are pointing fingers right back at Republicans, saying they would be perfectly willing to negotiate if Republicans would make two key concessions: drop the proposed cuts to Medicaid and scrap the tax breaks for the wealthy.

“Once you get rid of those two things, we can have a conversation,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) told TPM.

Durbin added any nascent bipartisan talks that have sprung up have been stuck in limbo, waiting to see whether Republicans can muscle through a bill on GOP votes alone.

“The Senate Republicans I’ve spoken to are all waiting for McConnell to say, ‘This is over. I can’t pass it.’”

Such an admission may come as soon as next week, when Republicans plan to hold a procedural vote on their health care bill whether or not they have secured enough votes for its passage.

“There comes a time where you have to fish or cut bait,” Kennedy told reporters. “We’ll either pass it or we won’t pass it, and if we can’t do it, let’s move on to something else.”

Donald Trump is gonna have the subs running most of his departments come Friday afternoon after he is sworn in….

When Bill Clinton was sworn into office 24 years ago, every single member of his Cabinet but one was confirmed by the Senate within two days. When Donald Trump is sworn in on Friday, he’ll be lucky to have half that many installed.

With Republicans in control of the White House and the Senate, it wasn’t supposed to be this difficult for Trump to get his team in place posthaste, especially since Democrats did away with the 60-vote requirement for Cabinet nominees. But all signs are pointing to a slog for Trump and the Senate GOP, even if Republicans believe eventually all of Trump’s picks will be approved.

“We were presented with the problem that the Trump administration was basically unprepared for presenting a Cabinet,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.). “They compounded that problem by picking both billionaires with enormously complicated financial situations, and people who have enormous conflicts of interests.”

Trump made his Cabinet selections in rapid fire after the election, but has been hampered since by ethics complications for some of them, Democratic opposition and an unforgiving calendar. His Cabinet is now on track to take the longest to fill since George H.W. Bush’s in 1989, according to an analysis by POLITICO of the confirmation process of the last five presidents.

Trump will also likely face by far the most dissenting votes from the Senate minority of any new administration in history….

In a stunning evening that proved most of the pundits and pollster wrong AGAIN….

Donald J. Trump has captured the American Presidency by virtue of the Electoral College numbers in the states…

It appears that Hillary Clinton, like Al Gore, could actually win the popular vote…

There will be complaining about that by Democrats , but this is the way this country picks it’s leader….

I don’t pretend to be happy about this…

But, I’ll get over it in a while…

Some thoughts….

First Donald Trump….

Forget most of the Bull Shit that Trump used to get the job…

He isn’t gonna reinvent America..

The place , that he ranted against isn’t set up to handle big changes….

Ask Barack Obama….

The Democrats and his own parties establishment will be pulling at him to conform and they have their own needs and wants…

Trump is gonna find in the time before he takes the job that it will harder than anything he has every done….

Now ALL of the private things he has tried to hide from others WILL be fair game for the Media and they will pounce…

All of the Media spotlight and negativity will only make Trump stronger to his cult like base…He has flaws…

But he will have support , because he is in the end a simple old timer that projects old fashion Republican ‘I don’t give a fuck’….

Now Hillary Clinton….

Hillary Clinton , as usual?

Ran a terrible campaign…

She is who she is….

And repeats the 2008 primary mistakes…

From day one she signaled that she did NOT like or want to campaign…

On a basic human level she quite conveyed that sense that she was one of us…

She was NEVER comfortable with the Media , that Sanders and Trump where able ride in the beginnings of their campaign….

She IS more qualified that anyone in modern history to BE President…

But to get the job?

THAT is NOT nearly enough…

But more that anything else?

Hillary Clinton lost the job because she simply could NOT get away from the email’s story…

The Republicans started on it…

She NEVER was able to explain the actions enough…

And in the waning days of the campaign the FBI Director put the issue front and center after House Republicans made him do it…

The Republicans played the long game against Hillary Clinton and she was never able to get ahead of it….

The Media…

The Media in the beginning got pimped as I continually said here when the ‘Donald’ jumped in…

And entertainer, not shy in front of the camera’s, with Bill Clinton’s need to be loved…He swept the GOP primaries by being larger than life and being willing sink lower than anybody else and call them names….

The played to the media’s hunger for something ‘different’…

After Trump won the nomination, the Media turned on him and he retreated from their embrace, but even with that ?….The Media was hooked…

Clinton , as mentioned before, has NEVER liked the media and will be a footnote to future candidate’s as how NOT to deal with the media…

The Pollsters….

They got is wrong…..

Almost ALL of them….

Wether it was people lying to them or other factors?

They screwed up in the general election as in the primaries…

We’ll be hearing why for the next four years…

The Black, Brown, and Yellow vote….

As in the Texas Governor race last time the Democrats sold everyone on the ‘ground game’…..

Its looks like it worked , because Clinton will probably end up with more votes than Trump…

But…

Barack Obama WAS History….

Hillary Clinton simply was as i say above NOT sold as such…

No matter what?

She is a white female…

While minorities came out in large numbers for her…

There hearts where NOT in it ….

The White Vote….

Let’s face it…

Donald Trump is the poster guy for the 20th Century White ‘I’m the MAN’….

With all of the 21st Century changes ushered in by America’s first Black (Mixed) President ?

A lot of white people ARE scared….

Donald Trump masterfully has used THAT for the last year to demobilize anyone that ain’t his religion or skin color….

He isn’t gonna build a Wall across the US Southern Border….

He isn’t gonna stop the flow of people coming here any better that President Obama who has had more deported that any America President ….

But the perception thing?

He and Republicans are aces at THAT ….

America is gonna be fine for the next four years….

The change parties thing is alive and well still….

For the last few weeks my posts here assumed a Clinton victory…

I and others WHERE WRONG…

We ALL must hope that Donald Trump can fumble thru this with the help of those who KNOW BETTER helping him measure up to the office….

Democrats have a LOT of soul searching to do….

I know America is divided ….

But the Democrats simply cannot run somebody that promises to make TOO much of a radical change in things…

Trump and the Republicans in the end will NOT dismantle ALL of Obama’s efforts…

America is in the 21st Century we cannot go backwards….

But Democrats need to find someone young with little history to be strapped around their efforts to run…

Democrats need to find someone who LOVES to campaign…

Democrats need to KEEP at efforts to organize Black, Brown, Yellow and Whites that will become MORE of what America is everyday…

Donald Trump IS a wake up call to Democrat’s….

This election like 2010 is a message….

And Democrats better get THAT message…

2018 is a cold wind coming and while the country changes?

Republicans could keep winning and trying to go inward and backwards, which is NOT what this countries strength is…

The Conservative Blog waxes on why they didn’t nominate Kentucky Libertarian/Republican Rand Paul who attcked Hillary Clinton from the jump….

Paul LED the GOP field early on and then faded….

Rand Paul was the perfect balance between a Libertarian and a Republican. Willing to rely more on Federalism than anything. He was socially flexible, but fiscally rock solid. His stances on the military were realistic, and his respect for religious liberty standing firm.

This is a man keeping his seat due to being reelected in Kentucky by both Democrats and Republicans.

But instead, Republicans were in a state of anger. For the last 7 years, they had been subjected to unfair treatment by the government, leftist finger wagging, and invasive social justice. They had been inundated with the hypocritical, racist, and economically destructive tactics of the Democratic party for nearly a decade, so that when someone came along that spoke irreverently enough about them, they were drawn like moths to a flame. Trump was fun to listen to, and his extreme promises sounded like just the measures needed to fix things.

The problem is, the Democrats saw that too.

As was noted particularly by this site, the emails from the Clinton campaign showed that she wanted to face Trump more than anybody. She knew his extreme stances and godawful personality would force him into so many corners and scandals that even someone like Hillary – one of the most disliked and scandal ridden candidates the Democrats have ever mustered – could win. They knew he would be divisive, and the house divided wouldn’t stand.

And snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, as the GOP is wont to do, they obliged. Republicans walked right into the trap laid for them, and even when the trap was revealed through WikiLeaks, Reince and the RNC doubled down. They’ve chosen to hold up a man few believe in, and those that do are being laughed at as fools who won’t accept that they’ve been played.

To sum it up, the GOP chose a man who was never slated to beat Hillary in any poll, who was her friend, donated to her campaign, has many of her same values, and turned out to be the snake everyone thought he was….

Why shouldn’t Nate Silver make some side money telling Republicans what they ALREADY KNOW?

Nate Silver, the ESPN journalist behind the FiveThirtyEight website, gave a presentation on the 2016 battleground map to a group of powerful Republican donors in Manhattan last week.

Silver was paid to give the presentation by the American Opportunity Alliance, a group led by some of the biggest GOP donors in the country, including hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer and the Ricketts family, which owns the Chicago Cubs.

Silver’s closed-door session was part of a two-day confab, held Sept. 7–8 at Le Bernardin Prive, a private dining room inside a New York City restaurant run by celebrity chef Eric Ripert.
Upward of three dozen top donors attended the gathering, along with senior Republican Party officials and strategists. Silver’s presentation on Wednesday afternoon was a highlight of the two-day event, people at the event said.

They don’t really identify with the idea’s of the Democrats or President Obama or Hillary Clinton….

Or increasingly Donald Trump for that manner, who they will vote for…(his numbers are dropping within the party regulars)

So when he loses?

There may be a fight among those who want the party….

But the people of the party ain’t going anyplace….

The Republicans’ presidential nominee is flailing in the polls, careening from controversy to controversy and doing so poorly that some in the party leadership are considering unofficially cutting him loose. Some in the rank and file share that underwhelmed sentiment. Past GOP nominees have had favorability ratings in the 80s from fellow members of their party. Trump’s most recent Gallup rating on that front was 68.

They may like their nominee a bit less than usual. But increasingly, they’re happy with the GOP itself: 8 in 10 Republicans have a favorable opinion of their party right now, according to a Pew Research Center survey out Thursday — 13 percent more than felt the same way back in June:

It’s actually pretty normal for voters to feel warmer and fuzzier about their party after a convention. That’s the whole point of a convention: to rally the troops and get them excited about November….

…

…..for all the talk by Republican elites who think Trump is a disaster for the party and are predicting doom and gloom, this Pew survey provides a reminder that a majority of the party’s voters aren’t necessarily unhappy with the way things are going.

In a new Public Policy Poll (D) 61% of respondents who back Donald Trump say they would support their state succeding for the Unted States of America if Hillary Clinton won the Presidential election

Among ALL Texasan’s the opt-out vote drops to only 26%..which is pretty high anyways

The same poll has Hillary Clinton trailing Trump in Texas by only 6%…..The MOE id 3.2% pts….Which means Clinton just COULD be only 3% pts behind Trump, or 9%pts….

More than 3 in 5 of Donald Trump’s supporters in Texas say they would back secession if Hillary Clinton becomes president, according to a new poll.

Sixty-one percent of Texans backing Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, want out of the U.S. if Clinton, the Democratic nominee, wins, according to the Public Policy Polling (PPP) survey released Tuesday.

Twenty-nine percent of Trump’s supporters in Texas, meanwhile, favor their state staying in the union, even if the billionaire loses this November.

The piece does NOT sample the big cities in the state that one would assume would supportive of Democrats…

The piece probably is more of a judgement on Trump and Cruz….

I found the comment about Democrats being the *’Rich’ class amazing…..

This past week’s Republican National Convention in Cleveland brought drama and media attention, but there was little immediate evidence that it had changed the thinking of voters in several communities in the battleground state that hosted the four-day event.

On the eastern side of Ohio, where rural coal and manufacturing towns are struggling, many people said they already had decided to vote for Republican nominee Donald Trump and didn’t tune in to a convention that, in large part, presented messages and policies aimed at working-class communities such as theirs.

In the more populous, well-to-do suburbs around Columbus, in the state’s center, voters expressed more interest in the goings-on, but not much enthusiasm.

In Woodsfield, a town of 2,300 in the state’s southeastern hills, the televisions at Traditions, a local restaurant, were tuned to game shows or the Great American Country network on the first night of the convention. Some here said they had made their choice of candidate and didn’t need to hear more….

…

Mr. Trump’s rise has amplified a national trend in which Republicans are drawing strength from working-class voters and Democrats from the professional class.

*When I was a kid, the Democrats were today’s Republicans, and the Republicans were today’s Democrats,” said Pere Seward, chairman of the executive committee for the Republican Party in Monroe County. Now, “the Democrats are the party of the rich,” he said….

…

Unlike Monroe County, Delaware County is thriving. Luxury homes are rising out of former soybean and corn fields sitting along roads so new that they don’t appear on maps or smartphones.

Delaware is solidly Republican. It gave Mr. Romney 61% of the vote in 2012, and Republican voter registrations outnumber the Democratic rolls by 3 to 1. But support for Mr. Trump seems less solid than in Monroe County. Many elected Republican officials in the county take a pass on talking to the media about the presidential race, and several voters said they weren’t sure they would cast a vote for president….

This is the second poll out AFTER FBI Director Comey and AG Lynch passed judgement on Hillary Clinton’s messy email thing….

I’m not surprised that Clinton has taken a hit….THAT was to be expected….

But I’m ALSO NOT surprised that she REMAINS ahead of Trump in the poll….Trump still has higher unfavorables than Clinton….

The poll is HUGE, almost 8,000 sampled…..

We’ll see what other polls will say in the week or so….

I expect Clinton to bounce back in next weeks polls since Donald Trump has almost disappeared and Clinton ads are EVERYWHERE along with Dallas shooting story and Sanders now joining the rest of the Democrats against Trump….

Hillary Clinton’s lead over Donald Trump has fallen to 3 points nationwide, according to a new poll.

A main character businessman/performer come sometime politician that NOBADY knows what will come out of his mouth…

And anticipated protests that could match the 1968 party convention….

Oh, and LOT of cops and media …..

Rock on Republicans this week!

Let the show begin!

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus is bracing for a chaotic convention.

Thousands of party leaders, delegates, reporters and activists are descending on Cleveland for a week of platform and rules committee hearings as Republicans prepare to nominate a candidate that has divided the GOP and been a flashpoint for controversy.

Those meetings will take place under the shadow of a traumatic week marked by the massacre of five police officers in Dallas and the deaths of two black men killed at the hands of law enforcement and subsequent protests.

In an interview with The Hill at RNC headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, just hours before he was scheduled to board a plane for Cleveland, Priebus opened up about how the convention would play out amid a backdrop of roiling anger and unease.

“It’s understandable that people everywhere across the country are a little nervous about what’s been going on around the country,” Preibus said. “It’s making us all a little uptight and concerned, there’s no question.”

Convention planners have been preparing to deal with massive protests in Cleveland for months. The city took out a $50 million insurance policy and law enforcement has plans in place for a potentially rowdy crowd outside.

But the violent episodes that have played out in the streets across the country will add an additional layer of tension to the event. Some delegates and elected officials have expressed concern about their safety.

Priebus said he’s been in touch with convention CEO Jeff Larson in recent days to ensure they’re taking every precaution to protect convention goers and protesters alike.

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) has launched a talking filibuster on the Senate floor in an effort to force Republicans and Democrats to come to an agreement on legislation to deny suspected terrorists from purchasing firearms and requiring universal background checks.

The Senate is debating a spending bill that Democrats hope to offer gun amendments to, but Murphy said that the Senate should “not proceed with debate on amendments to this bill until we have figured out a way to come together on, at the very least, two simple ideas.”

…

The Democrats’ floor fight came as some potential signs of compromise arose on gun measures in the Senate. A spokeswoman for Everytown for Gun Safety, the pro-gun control group led by former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, confirmed Wednesday morning that they were working with Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) on measures to ensure suspected terrorists could not purchase weapons….